UFUK TARHAN Interview

UFUK TARHAN
Futurist, Economist, Author

Among the subjects that I focused in my works that we call Keynote, education, seminar, conference, moderation, panel, project and actualized in various forms and constructs, there are ”Futurism, future, hyper, trends, technology, digitization, transformation, business world, career”.

Futurist, Economist, Author Ufuk Tarhan, Futurist, Economist, Presi- dent of Digital Agency. Graduated from the Middle East Technical Uni- versity (METU), Department of Eco- nomics. Since 1982, she has worked as a top executive, general manager and board member in various com- panies and industries mainly in IT & telecommunications.

In 2002, she was awarded as “The Most Successful Businesswoman In The IT Industry”. She founded M-GEN Future Planning Center in 2006 & M-GEN Sowtware & Digi- tal Communication Services Ltd in 2011. She is ranked among Futurist Influencers , “All Futurists” Google Serach, top 100 female futurists in the world lists and known as busi- ness designer and avatar.

Gives conferences and lectures like “How To Create A Better Future?” “Be a T-Human”, “Get Prepared for Digital, AI, Robotic, Energy Revolu- tions’ Future”etc. She is first mem- bers and former president of the Fu- turists Society (TFD) in Turkey and still the only woman futurist keynote speaker, moderator and facilitator in Turkey.

Can we know more about the Futurist Ufuk Tarhan? Would you like to share the scope of your studies, training, and semi- nars you offer?

Futurist, simply the Futurist T-Human Ufuk Tarhan, is a hardworking dreamer profile, in which we call it ‘’visionary doer “, wondering 7/24 ‘’what will be the future of everything? What can be better? What should be done? and striving to do ”at least one good thing’’ for each day. J Among the subjects that I focused in my works that we call Keynote, educa- tion, seminar, conference, moderation, panel, project and actualized in various forms and constructs, there are ”Futur- ism, future, hyper, trends, technology, digitization, transformation, business world, career”. What I want to is to identify and share what people, and hence the institutions need to do for the sustain- able and rising business, career success. Acting beyond thoughts and promises; to inspire, to give hope, to motivate for change and transformation. Even pro- voke, and impassion! To create an impact, 51 discipline and working motive that will lead to success, positive developments and revolution. In order to read more in detail and understand my work, I suggest to have a look at www.ufuktarhan.com or the QR code right next to it.

What is Futurism? What do we need to understand?

Usually, the developments and works in the field of technology, digitalization, soft- ware, etc. come to mind. Futurism means ‘’the positive future design’’. It is the field of work to produce, share and develop future information, scenarios, and fictions that will help us find what should be done for a better future.In other words, we can say that; futurism is a discipline that tries to a futuristic stance compared to history’s retrospective stance. In fact, futurism is the totality of efforts to trans- form information, probabilities, scenarios, into workable data just by considering the future probabilities of what is likely to be experienced in the near future? or what good or evil might happen if ex- perienced?; just as the effort of history, turning past experiences into a concrete knowledge.

Behind the reason why futurism first comes to mind in terms of technology, digitalization, software, or the developments and works in these areas, lays the fact that these factors are determinants and central in the basis of almost all changes, transformations, and movements. Technology pulls the trigger in almost all aspects of life while the software digitizes and transforms. Otherwise, there will be no knowledge, science, art, sport, life/work area outside of futurism, which is not of interest or does not affect it! .

What is the place of futurism in our lives?

There is no place in our life that has no futurism. Every- thing has a future. The future is a process, a flow that comes to everything that is alive and lifeless. That is why futurism, the effort to design the future positively, is actually the life itself. We cannot really say ”Futurism is interested in this, not interested in that! or“ It has nothing to do with the future etc. Such approaches and thoughts whether we know futurism or not, it is fine, whether we produce future knowledge or not it is fine, whether we use it or not it is fine, are totally meaning- less and baseless. If it is impossible for us to move to the next stage without understanding, deciphering, analyzing, and interpreting the past and history in terms of usefulness, functionality, and consequentiality, this is the case for our future.
In a nutshell, Futurism is in all parts of our lives, and in the very center. Most people are just not aware of it yet. That’s why me and people like me who work in this field, are trying to raise awareness in this regard. Some people, uninten- tionally, utilize futurism effectively without naming.

I call them organic futurists. More and more often, I hear people saying that ‘’mmm I was actually a futurist, and was using it quite a lot.

Can you tell us about Futuristic Fashion?How does it emerge as the product of thought?

Since fashion and trend are two inseparables, I would like to answer this question by evaluating both together. Fashion reflects peo- ple’s differentiation, position/class separation, and evolution in addition to the acquisition of charm with the renewal of individual appearance.

Fashion undergoes a change when the transformation occurs as a result of individual and social trends.The faster the social transfor- mation, the faster fashion changes. Fashion comes out the when a trend, disposition, orientation, current are widely accepted, used by large audiences, and becomes popular. The trend is the cause of fashion, fashion is the result of the trend. Fashion can be sum- marized as the reflection of man’s impulse to be different and to attract attention. In other words, fashion is the feeling to search for what is better and nicer.

It is the desire to exchange what is different from the old and dress up instead of the cover-up. In short, the phrase we need to remem- ber to separate the two may be the following; ”Trends turn into strong, and long-lasting trends and eventually into fashion’’. If we look at the trend / fashion difference a little more closley;

While the trend describes the general, orientation, current, development or changes happening in one direction, fashion is the description of the way something is constructed and formatted in that specific time period.

– While the trend is popular at a particular time, Fashion is the latest, most current popular clothes, makeup, cars, device mod- el, a behavior format.

– While the trend describes the general, orientation, current, de- velopment or changes happening in one direction, fashion is the description of the way something is constructed and formatted in that specific time period.

– The trend is used in many different areas such as fashion, tech- nology, finance, weather, science, work/life/ behavior, fashion is preferred when describing topics on fashion, behavior, clothing, decoration.

Naturally, the rising trends of the future shape the future of fash- ion when it comes to understanding and interpreting concepts in this way. Futurist designers are those who design clothing according to the life we think of in the future and design. What they design is called futurist fashion.

For example; 3D clothing, accessories or color, heat, shape-changing, stain-repellent, curing nano-technological clothing, products that we call wearable technology. They all explain the relationship between futurism and fashion

Natural resources and energy-saving designs are the focus of futuristic fashion. Would you like to elaborate on your projects in this regard?

In recent years, fashion is considered one of the blame indus- tries that consume, pollute, generate the most waste of world resources, and cause people to misuse their resources eco- nomically by textile industries, environmentalists, young people like Greta. The fashion industry is considered to be one of the most damaging, ecologically vulnerable business lines by new generations, people who are young and sensitive to the environ- ment. This increases the orientation to concepts and approach- es called ”sustainable fashion“, ”fast-slow fashion“, ”organic, ecological fashion“ and so on.
Behind all of these, control of ozone release, ecological raw material, use of renewable energy, producing units, distribution, sales, marketing, use, supply chain processes in short, there lays trends such as the adoption of cyclic economic principles without generating waste and the direction to ‘’not excessive but necessary and useful production / use.’’.

What do you want to say about the future of fash- ion, the fashion of the future? How do you think will be the fashion shows in the future? What kind of extraordinary designs will we be seeing?

In fact, we have seen the minimum so far. J But we’ll see many more uncommon features. Tomorrow is another day. With the expansion of the following trends, a new sense of fashion and environment will occur;

Emerging trends:

– Dissemination of sensitive / environmentally friendly products, materials, and accessories, that are ecological, sustainable, cyclic, designed and produced in accordance with the principles of economy,

– Increasing the variety and usage of smart / online clothes in work and life areas with technological textile,

– A rapid increase in the use of technology such as artificial intelli- gence, robots, renewable energy, 3D, hologram, virtual/augment- ed reality and in all processes such as fashion show, sales, market- ing, design, production, distribution, etc.

– Fly-man, on-vehicle wraps, and accessories,

– The birth of fashion space for a brand of new clothing for space-faring,

– The spread of personalized, instant production opportunities,

What do you recommend to our companies operat- ing in the textile sector? What do you advise to our companies in preparing themselves for the future?

1. First of all, they must have the habit of using futurism in an effec- tive, continuous, focused manner.

2. They must read my book, titled as “T-İnsan”, (http://www.t-insan. com). Let them be a T-Human first. I claim this book is the most important reference point in the field. Anyway, the 22nd edition is almost over. It is already commendably famous.

3. They should take into account each of the above substances, the flow, the vision seriously.

Those, who do not configure himself, his team or his work accord- ing to the wishes of the future and far from technology and the topics I have listed, will go out of the play in a very short time.

My advice is to take action keeping in mind that a stitch in time saves nine.